For Unless One Is Born Again of Water and the Holy Spirit
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The following is an excerpt from The MacArthur New Testament Commentary on John 3.
Nicodemus said to Him, "How tin can a human be born when he is onetime? He cannot enter a second time into his mother'due south womb and exist built-in, can he?" Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of h2o and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Practice not exist amazed that I said to y'all, 'Y'all must exist born again.' The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of information technology, merely practice non know where it comes from and where it is going; and then is everyone who is born of the Spirit." (3:4–viii)
Jesus' shocking statement was far more than Nicodemus had expected. Incredulous, Nicodemus said to Him, "How tin a homo be born when he is old? He cannot enter a 2d time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?" Certainly, this highly educated Pharisee was not so obtuse as to have misinterpreted Jesus' words in a simplistically literal sense. He knew our Lord was non talking almost being physically reborn, merely he replied in the context of the Lord's analogy. How could he beginning all over, get back to the beginning? Jesus was telling him that archway to God's conservancy was not a matter of adding something to all his efforts, non topping off his religious devotion, but rather canceling everything and starting all over again. At the same fourth dimension, he clearly could not grasp the full meaning of what that meant. His questions convey his defoliation, as he openly wondered at the impossibility of Christ's statement. Jesus was asking for something that was not humanly possible (to be born once again); He was making entrance into the kingdom contingent on something that could not be obtained through human effort. Simply if that was true, what did it mean for Nicodemus's works-based organization? If spiritual rebirth, like physical rebirth, was impossible from a human being standpoint, then where did that leave this self-righteous Pharisee?
Far from minimizing the demands of the gospel, Jesus confronted Nicodemus with the well-nigh difficult claiming He could make. No wonder Christ would later say to His disciples, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!" (Marking 10:24). By calling him to be built-in again, Jesus challenged this most religious Jew to admit his spiritual bankruptcy and abandon everything he was trusting in for salvation. That is precisely what Paul did, as he declared in Philippians 3:8–9:
More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I accept suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Police, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of organized religion.
Jesus answered Nicodemus's defoliation by elaborating on the truth He introduced in verse 3: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." A number of interpretations have been offered to explain the phrase born of water. Some see two births hither, i natural, and the other spiritual. Proponents of this view interpret the water as the amniotic fluid that flows from the womb simply before childbirth. But it is not clear that the ancients described natural nascency in that mode. Further, the phrase built-in of water and the Spirit parallels the phrase "built-in over again" in poesy 3; thus, just one nascency is in view. Others see in the phrase born of water a reference to baptism, either that of John the Baptist, or Christian baptism. But Nicodemus would not accept understood Christian baptism (which did non yet exist) nor misunderstood John the Baptist's baptism. Nor would Jesus take refrained from baptizing people (four:two) if baptism were necessary for salvation. Still others see the phrase every bit a reference to Jewish ceremonial washings, which being built-in of the Spirit transcends. Withal the two terms are not in dissimilarity with each other, but combine to course a parallel with the phrase "born again" in verse three. (For a careful test of the diverse interpretations of born of water, see D. A. Carson, The Gospel According to John, The Colonnade New Testament Commentary [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991], 191–96.)
Since Jesus expected Nicodemus to understand this truth (v. ten), it must take been something with which he was familiar. Water and Spirit often refer symbolically in the Old Testament to spiritual renewal and cleansing (cf. Num. xix:17–19; Isa. 4:iv; 32:15; 44:3; 55:ane; Joel two:28–29; Zech. 13:1). In one of the about glorious passages in all of Scripture describing Israel's restoration to the Lord by the new covenant, God said through Ezekiel,
For I will have y'all from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land. So I will sprinkle make clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will requite you lot a new heart and put a new spirit inside you; and I volition remove the heart of stone from your flesh and requite yous a middle of mankind. I volition put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances. (Ezek. 36:24–27)
Information technology was surely this passage that Jesus had in heed, showing regeneration to be an One-time Testament truth (cf. Deut. 30:6; Jer. 31:31–34; Ezek. 11:18–xx) with which Nicodemus would accept been acquainted. Confronting this Erstwhile Attestation backdrop, Christ'south point was unmistakable: Without the spiritual washing of the soul, a cleansing accomplished only by the Holy Spirit (Titus three:5) through the Give-and-take of God (Eph. five:26), no i can enter God's kingdom.
Jesus continued by further emphasizing that this spiritual cleansing is wholly a piece of work of God, and not the result of human effort: "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is built-in of the Spirit is spirit." Just as only human nature can beget man nature, so too but the Holy Spirit can effect spiritual transformation. The term flesh (sarx) here refers but to human being nature (as it does in 1:13–14); in this context, information technology does not have the negative moral connotation that it oftentimes does in Paul's writings (e.g., Rom. 8:i–8, 12–xiii). Even if a physical rebirth were possible, it would produce only mankind. Thus, simply the Spirit can produce the spiritual birth required for entrance into God's kingdom. Regeneration is entirely His work, unaided by whatever human effort (cf. Rom. 3:25).
Although Jesus' words were based on Old Testament revelation, they ran completely contrary to everything Nicodemus had been taught. For his entire life he had believed that salvation came through his own external merit. Now he found it exceedingly difficult to retrieve otherwise. Enlightened of his astonishment, Jesus continued, "Do not be amazed that I said to you, 'You must exist born again.' " The verb translated must is a stiff term; John used it elsewhere in his gospel to refer to the necessity of the crucifixion (3:14; 12:34), of John the Baptist's inferiority to Christ (iii:30), of the proper method of worshiping God (four:24), of Jesus carrying out His ministry (four:4; 9:4; 10:16), and of the necessity of the resurrection (20:9). It was absolutely necessary for Nicodemus to get over his astonishment at existence so wrong about how one is accepted into God's kingdom and seek to be born over again if he was to enter. And he could never do and then based on his own righteous works.
Then the Lord illustrated His point with a familiar case from nature: "The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, only do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit." The wind cannot be controlled; it blows where information technology wishes. And though its general management can be known, where it comes from and where it is going cannot be precisely determined. Nevertheless, the wind's effects can be observed. The aforementioned is truthful of the work of the Spirit. His sovereign work of regeneration in the man eye can neither be controlled nor predicted. Withal its effects can be seen in the transformed lives of those who are built-in of the Spirit.
Source: https://www.gty.org/library/bibleqnas-library/QA0302/what-does-it-mean-to-be-born-of-water-and-spirit
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